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BABBLE O' GREEN FIELDS 

and Other Poems 

BY 
MARK WAYNE WILLIAMS 




BOSTON 

SHERMAN, FRENCH <^ COMPANY 

1915 






Copyright, 1915 
Sherman, French df Company 



OEt; (7 19/5 

©CI.A41693S 



V 



O READER 

I bring my fistful of pebbles 

From the beach of experience. 
I, too, regret that they are not diamonds and rubies. 
Child, they are better than pearls and emeralds. 
They are enchanted stones; 

Fashioned by the great deep, 

Laid at your feet by the mighty tide, 
That your heart might know the leap and ache 
Of vast discovery, and you exclaim, 

" Oh, what if this were chalcedon^ 

And that an amethyst ! " 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Babble o' Green Fields 1 

In Westminster Abbey 3 

Back to Bethlehem 4 

The Seamless Vestment 5 

The Highwayman 7 

At Frisco, 1898 8 

Moonlight 10 

A Jubilee Hymn 11 

The Blind Man 13 

To Shepherds Watching on the Plain . . 15 

The Prodigal 17 

Hymn 19 

Tonight 20 

Harvest Thanksgiving 21 

The Heavenly Hobo 23 

Bye and Bye 27 

A New Leaf 28 

The " U " IN Universe 29 

When Winds Are Whist 30 

The Cavalier ^1 

The Eighth Wonder 33 

Sesame ^^ 

The Hunt 35 

Window Shades 37 

" We Have Seen His Star " 38 

November Day 39 

Found Drowned 41 

A Lump of Coal 42 

Modern Morpheus 44 



PAGE 

Rain at Bunker Hill 45 

The Old Preacher 46 

Revery in August 47 

An 'Aporth of Language 51 

Wordsworth 52 

The Pool of London 53 

Prayer 55 

Enough 56 

Sonnet in A[^ 57 

OoMPS 58 

Sunset and Evening 60 

There Was a King 62 

The Hitting of the Sawdust Trail . . 63 

In the Library 66 

Sonoma 67 

Spring Break 68 

Love's Bimetallism 70 

What Price Happiness? 71 

On a Pastel Portrait of a Child ... 72 

Earthquakes 73 

The Cloister 75 

The Drama 77 

Fire and Water 79 

Midsummer Rest 80 

" When I Consider " 82 

New Year's Greeting 83 

Happy Old Year 84 



BABBLE 'O GREEN FIELDS 
AND OTHER POEMS 



BABBLE O' GREEN FIELDS 

MONSTROUS puncheon of humours, mildew of 

moon and clay, 
Babble in death with thy taproom breath 
O' the new green fields, the dew clean fields, 
Green fields kirtled with May. 

O Jack, hast green in thine eye, lad, or doth the 

blessed child in thy breast 
Toddling linger, holding mother's finger. 
In daisy-springing, brown-thrush-singing, but- 
terfly-winging. 
Green fields mother loved best. 

Bowls and cricket are done, lad, and the censer 

of twilight smokes. 
Sweethearts pass o'er the velvet grass 
O' the rare green fields, the fair, clean fields, 
Green fields, guarded by their oaks. 

Babble, they call it babble, but it's all of it gos- 
pel true. 
Death clears the pane. Look, lads, again. 
At the aery green, faery green, ever widening 
prairie green — 
Green fields, dabbled with the dew. 



[1] 



I know fields that once were fair, queenly Ypres 

merged in mud. 
I hear the flail of the hell-hot hail 
On the mad red fields, the §ad, dead fields, 
Dread fields burgeoning with blood. 
God ! will there never more be Spring? Or do I 

babble or pray ? 
Bubble Tophet — babble prophet, 
O' the far green fields, the star clean fields, — 
Green fields kirtled with May. 



m 



IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY 

Through life's cathedral from my organ soul 
Recessional surges of music roll ; 
With invisible voices of fluting song 
Nave and chancel and transept throng. 
The unseen Organist in the loft 
Moveth all moods from loud to soft ; 
Harmonic sonance born of love 
Breathes from the mercy seat above. 



[8] 



BACK TO BETHLEHEM 

Let us go back to Bethlehem. 

O'er waves and dunes ; o'er wastes and downs ; 

Past palace turrets and seething towns ; 

By rough ways, smooth ways, ways white and 

red; 
From marble barracks to the House of Bread; 
From Athens, Rome, and Jerusalem, — 
Let us go back to Bethlehem. 

Let us go back to Bethlehem. 

There Ruth's gleaning ; the mild sheep graze ; 

By sweet love's deathbed Jacob prays ; 

David plies harp, or staff, or spear, 

Or spills cold water, thrice too dear, 

As he waits for his twelve-starred diadem : 

Let us go back to Bethlehem. 

Let us go back to Bethlehem. 

Heaven's in a manger ; from one grot springs 

The eternal source of memorable things. 

O simple of heart, from one voice rise 

Angelic chorals ; from lovelit eyes 

Bloom star-truths on their twilight stem: 

Let us go back to Bethlehem. 



[4] 



THE SEAMLESS VESTMENT 

Soldiers crucified God's Son: 
Hail Tiberius' throne. 
One of Carthage deemed him great, 
Fed on Barca's hate ; 
. Venture-avid Philip's son 
Witched the Macedon. 
Cassar, vast ambition's tower, 
Lured Italian power; 
Stirred Arminius' name like wine, 
Freeman of the Rhine. 
None knew, throned on cross above. 
Manhood's King of Love. 

Soldiers slew the Prince of Peace : 

Grace to mob's caprice. 

Lived thej as the dice-box willed — 

He God's plan fulfilled. 

Prizing rags, they prized not Him, 

Racked with tortured limb. 

Sash, cloak, turban, shoes, they share : 

Who shall vestment wear, — 

Vestment woven of hopes and fears. 

Moist with mother's tears ; 

Linen for priest and king's delight, 

Fine and saintly white ; 

No patched motley, seamed and riven,- 

Whole from loom of heaven.? 

[5] 



Who is worth His coat to wear? 
Cross he too shall bear. 
Prophet's cloak from chariot flung 
Makes new prophets strong. 
Strong is he, though world enticed, 
Girt in the coat of Christ. 
Welcome, in such raiment dressed, 
Jesus' wedding guest. 



[6] 



THE HIGHWAYMAN 

No mask we wear ; no pistol bear ; 

No foaming steed bestride ; 
The stars beneath, on Hounslow heath 

No lawless quest we ride. 

God's holy word our girded sword, 
We voice our Lord's command ; 

On the King's highway in open day 
We summon you to " Stand." 

" Deliver " — self, not sundry pelf ; 

He wants your life, not gold. 
A HOLD-UP — yes, till you confess 

Him who doth life uphold. 



[7] 



AT FRISCO, 1898 

THE SENTINEL SOLILOQUIZES 

The fog-horn shouts through the sounding bay, 

(Sing of battle and blood and war!) 

And the sea wind rolls up a wall of spray, 

A cloud of pallid and deathful grey ; 

A fog of more baneful and shuddering chill 

Than Indian moonlit dews distill ; 

And the sentinel drags through the yielding 

sands 
With his musket heavy and loose in his hands, 
(How the fog-horn shouts from the far off bay!) 
For limbs grow weary and eyelids weigh 
With the enemy six thousand miles away. 

Could battle break with the break of day, 
(Dream of battle and blood and gore!) 
With the cannon's boom and the charger's neigh ; 
The leaden storm where the Maxims play ; 
The shudder of lines as they gap and fill ; 
The rush of the charge to the topmost hill ; — 
Could there but be danger from hostile bands. 
His eyes would glow through the dark like 

brands. 
(Hark; only the foghorn off the bay!) 
For limbs grow weary and eyelids weigh 
With the enemy six thousand miles away. 



[8] 



We shall return, where others may. 

(Talk of battle and blood galore!) 

And we'll tell the story to those that stay, 

With warful clangour and brazen bray. 

And the hearts of the gentle folk we'll thrill 

With tales of bullets and balls that kill ; 

Of terrible marches and desperate stands ; 

Of wounds and sickness in hostile lands. 

(How the foghorn shouts from the sounding 

bay!) 
And they'll never know all the time we lay 
With the enemy six thousand miles away. 



[9] 



MOONLIGHT 
A RHAPSODY 

Airily, fairily, silver lights 

In the shifting shades are lying; 

Dancingly, glancingly, sylvan sprites 

With the lithe moonmaids are flying. 

So o'er my fond dreaming 

Vague imageries fleet, 

Mad melody streaming 

Fantasia sweet. 

Glintingly, hintingly, shadows frail 
O'er the moonlit woods are winging ; 
Cooingly, wooingly, waters pale 
To the shimmering stars are singing. 
So o'er my weird runing 
Soft sadnesses fall, 
Love-memories tuning 
A dear madrigal. 

Loomingly, gloomingly, vapours foul 

On hill and heath are lying ; 

Drearily, eerily, sombre owl 

In the death-dark woods is crying. 

Life's vapours are weaving 

Their sad shrouds for me ; 

Wails the heart all a-grieving 

A wild threnody. 

[10] 



A JUBILEE HYMN 

Jubilee ! God's Church is breaking 
From the fetters of man's making, 
And to Christly freedom waking, — 
Love and unity ! 

CHORUS 

Swell the rising chorus : 
Jesus, rule Thou o'er us ; 
Thy word divine, effulgent sign. 
Shall flame its way before us. 
Ever may Thy Spirit leading 
Flash Thy truths to minds unheeding. 
Make us hear the Saviour pleading, — - 
" May they all be one." 

Long has fellowship fast slumbered ; 
Long have strife and faction cumbered 
Let our evil days be numbered : 
Sound Thy jubilee ! 

CHORUS 

Bring to pass Thy garden vision ; 
Save Thy Church from the derision 
And the shame of her division: 
Sound Thy jubilee ! 

CHORUS 

[11] 



May we, round Thy cross uniting, 

Strong in comradeship, be fighting 

Age-long ills that cry for righting: 

Sound Thy jubilee ! 



CHORUS 



Jubilee ! The isles shall hear it ! 
Satan's shrinking hosts shall fear it ! 
Fill the whole earth with Thy Spirit,— 
Love and unity ! 



CHORUS 



Swell the rising chorus : 
Jesus, rule Thou o'er us ; 
Thy word divine, effulgent sign, 
Shall flame its way before us. 
Ever may Thy Spirit leading 
Flash Thy truths to minds unheeding. 
Make us hear the Saviour pleading, — 
" May they all be one." 



[12] 



THE BLIND MAN 

The shadow falls upon the way 

That leads from Jericho, 

For now the sun with lingering ray 

Has quenched in western waters deep his 

glow; 
But darkness lies not deeper 
'Mid shrouding night 
Than on the eyes awaiting 
For Christ to give them sight. 

Lordy I kneel to Thee, 

Lordy I kneel to Thee; 

Heal and save me. 

Heal and save me. 

Till I see, and know Thy light is for me. 

The crowds are surging through the 

street ; 
They jostle through the gate, 
And, helpless in his blindness, meet 
The poor and pitiful unfortunate. 
They tell him, " Christ is coming " ; 
That " He is nigh " ; 
Then o'er their motley murmurs 
There wails the plaining cry : 

" Lord, I kneel to Thee, 
Lord, I kneel to Thee; 
[13] 



Heal and save me. 
Heal and save me^ 
Till I see, and know Thy light is for me J" 

The splendour of the rising day 

Is on the city walls ; 

The glory of his new-born ray 

On dome and spire and gleaming turret 

falls ; 
But brighter than its beaming 
On brooding night 
The love of Christ is streaming 
To flood the soul with light. 

Lordy I kneel to Thee, 

Lordy I kneel to Thee; 

Heal and save me. 

Heal and save me. 

Till I see, and know Thy light is for me. 



[14] 



TO SHEPHERDS WATCHING 
ON THE PLAIN 

BALLADE 

Silence bursts into choral chime ; 
From starry spheres melodious choirs 
Chant forth a message more sublime 
Than prophets spake to Hebrew sires. 
Hush ! hark ! The note its song inspires — 
" Peace and goodwill " — a heavenly strain 
Sung to the wakeful by their fires, 
To shepherds watching on the plain. 

Across far fields of glistening rime 
Gleam palace dome and temple spire 
Where priestly pride and courtly crime 
Themselves in showy pomps attire. 
Not there heaven's harmony respires, 
But breathes unto a lowlier train 
In whose just breast no ill conspires — 
Meek shepherds watching on the plain. 

Not from Mt. Sinai's thunderous clime, 
From whose dread base the crowd retires ; 
Not Nebo, where in prideful prime, 
Lonely, entranced, the chief expires ; 
Not from the hills, those lofty pyres 
Of solitude, swells that refrain, — 
But sweetly struck from seraph lyres 
'Mid shepherds watching on the plain. 
[15] 



O Prince, grant, as our need requires. 
Thy grace, new born from heaven again ; 
The simple faith, the mild desires. 
Of shepherds on Judaea's plain. 



[16] 



THE PRODIGAL 

Oh, fast is the fall of the cataract turning 
The sheer-sided cliff to a shimmer of spray, 
But faster the feet of the prodigal spurning 
The home of his youth for a wanderer's way. 
Ah, wide is the way, by its pleasures attended. 
And giddily whisper the follies that fly. 
But bitterer far than the sweetness soon ended 
The husks of the swine and the filth of the sty. 

CHORUS 

Father, forgive me, 

Father, receive me ; 
Far from the famine of sin would I flee. 

Thy bounty hath fed me. 

Thy mercy hath led me 
Back from my hopelessness, homeward to Thee. 

Father ! could I but serve Thee, 

1 would be thine through the long years to be. 

Ah, drear is the waste of the waters unending 
To the far driven bark in the fate-haunted gloam, 
But drearier far for the prodigal bending 
His recreant steps to his once cherished home. 
He sees the sad wrecks of his hope once beguiling. 
The ghastly reminders of once beamy day ; 
He longs for the light of his father's face smiling. 
But shrinks in his shame and in doubting dismay. 

CHORUS 

[17] 



Ah, sweet is the waft of the violin chorus 

When budding hearts wed 'mid the blossoms of 

June, 
But lovelier still breathes the melody o'er us 
From the heart once discordant, now thrilling in 

tune. 
Ah, glad was the song when the dawn stars were 

singing 
And hymning the glory of God among men, 
But tenderer far heaven's music is ringing 
For one who has come to his Father again. 

CHORUS 

Father, forgive me, 

Father, receive me ; 
Far from the famine of sin would I flee. 

Thy bounty hath fed me, 

Thy mercy hath led me 
Back from my hopelessness, homeward to Thee. 

Father ! could I but serve Thee, 

1 would be thine through the long years to be. 



[18] 



HYMN 

God of our life, we lift to Thee 
The chalice of our emptiness. 
Fill us, until Thy waters press 
And overflow in ecstasy. 
And our full cup of blessing lead 
To the wan lips of human need. 

God of our light, within Thy ray 
The orient ages lie empearled; 
'Tis but the shadow of the world 
A moment shuts our souls from Day. 
Oh, rive these clouds of doubt and sin, 
And ray Thy lustrous glory in. 

God of our love, the sweet appeal 
Of Thee rills in the raucous mart. 
And pulses in the painful heart. 
And breathes where fetid vapors reel. 
Hear, Saviour, our sad heart's unrest. 
And hold us closer to Thy breast. 

From shrouded ways we cannot see ; 
From love near strangled in our strife ; 
From death that swallows up our life ; — 
We cry, O Father God, to Thee. 
Be Thou our Life, our Love, our Light, 
Be Thou our Dawning after night. 

[19] 



TONIGHT 

Tonight there kneels in her chamber 
A woman lone and old, 
Dim-eyed, and wan and withered. 
Her hair turned grey from gold. 
Alone she prayeth at midnight. 
With soundless words and few. 
But oh, thy mother, sinner, is praying, 
Praying for you, for you. 

I see the throne room of glory, 

The saints and angels near ; 

One comes with his hands nail-pierced. 

And red from the griding spear. 

Before the throne and the angels 

He pleads b}^ his passion's hue, 

And oh, thy Saviour, sinner, is pleading. 

Pleading for you, for you. 

The skies are hushed and are silent; 
Expectant breathes the night ; 
The star of dawning is waiting; 
The sun, afar, thrills with light. 
From field and forest and river 
Grace waits like a blissful dew, 
And heaven itself, O Sinner, is yearning, 
Yearning for you, for you. 



[20] 



HARVEST THANKSGIVING 

To God wc offer praise 
For His autumnal days 

And harvest cheer. 
Through sunshine and through cloud 
Thine Earth is garland browed, 
And springing mercies crowd 

Thy plenteous year. 

To God we offer praise 
For all our sunless days 

Of mist and moan. 
In sorrow and distress 
We were not comfortless ; 
Came through the wilderness 

Gleams of Thy throne. 

To God we offer praise 
For all our gloomless days 

With gladness bright. 
Thy purer Spirit fires 
Sublimed our best desires, 
Floating joy's loftiest spires 

In holy light. 

To Christ we offer praise 
Who with us " all the days " 
Abidcth aye. 

[21] 



Oh, lift us from the ground ; 
Let gracious fruits abound; 
May our full life be crowned 
With endless day. 



[22] 



THE HEAVENLY HOBO 

" Enoch walked with God " 

Oh, jour lord may drive his chariot 
From Kadesh down to Keriot, — 
Chariots of ease, chariots of ire, 
Steam and steel and speed and fire ; 
Limousine or a Ford machine, 
Transit swift to heart's desire ; 
Electric car or whizzing plane, 
Earth's mechanic arts are vain; 
Edison at heaven balks, — 
But Enoch walks. 

Crook of knees and crunch of toes, 

Peripatetic sainthood goes. 

Tagged with scriptures, ragged with promises. 

Windy garb to sleek clad Thomases, 

Lonely o'er the lilied lawn, lonely down the lau- 
relled lane, 

Passing — passing — who ne'er will pass this 
way again. 

Tall, taller than farthest cloud; 

Eyes by sun or shade uncowed ; 

Head by heat or storm unbowed ; 

Stumbling never over mountain or clod ; — 

He walks with God. 



[23] 



Uncivilised apotheosis of dissent; 

Stark Protestant, whom the galleys of custom 

never bent ; 
Dweller in the shieling on the crag ; 
Brooder of the universe ; 
Scorner of tax collector Judas and his bag ; 
Scoffer at Pluto's pride of purse ; — 
Thy Declaration of Independence 
The stars have written in the seas, 
And the myrmidons of brute ascendence 
Scattered like spray in a winter breeze. 
And the crepulous horde of human ills 
Fled from thy sun in the morning hills. 

Oh, your lord may drive his chariot 
From Kadesh down to Keriot, — 
Chariots of ease, chariots of ire. 
Steam and steel and speed and fire; 
Limousine or a Ford machine. 
Transit swift to hearfs desire; 
Electric car or whizzing plane, 
Earth^s mechanic arts are vain; 
Edison at heaven balks, — 
But Enoch walks. 



[24] 



For he agreed to walk with God 

Wherever he might be ; 

And he found from London to Labrador 

He was ever in God's countrie. 

Ever Italian amethyst skies ; ever the thrushes in 
the Black Forest sang ; 

Ever rose Alpine diamond crests, and the deep 
diapasons of the sea surge rang; 

Naples bay, Rhine rocks, dear English dales, 

Tyrol, Trossach, fiord and canyon, water 
spra3^s of Wales ; 

Ever the fir-sloped Sierras, corn-plains green 
and great; 

Ever the morn o'er the Golden Horn, or the sun- 
set ruddy o'er the Golden Gate : 

Blazing wastes of Sahara bloom to the old home 
sod 

For him who walks with God. 

O/i, your lord may drive his chariot 
From Kadesh down to Keriot, — 
Chariots of ease, chariots of ire. 
Steam and steel and speed and fire; 
Limousine or a Ford machine. 
Transit swift to heart's desire; 
Electric car or whizzing plane. 
Earth's mechanic arts are vain; 
Edison at heaven balks, — 
But Enoch walks, 

[25] 



And God translated. I caught a butterfly's 

velvet wings — 
Alas for their delicate beauty, alas for petals of 

rose — 
Not Pope nor Dryden can capture from Homer 

or Virgil who sings, 
For human translation ever blights poetry into 

prose. 
But God, the subtler artist, from the drab of the 

drudging mire 
Rays roses, subliming our primeval dust to im- 
mortal fire ; 
Turns a muddy road to a Milky Way ; gives 

leaden hearts sky-leaven. 
And translates the prose of the common life to 

the poetry of heaven. 

Oh, your lord may drive his chariot 
From Kadesh down to Keriot, — 
Chariots of ease, chariots of ire. 
Steam and steel and speed and fire; 
Limousine or a Ford machine. 
Transit swift to heart's desire; 
Electric car or whizzing plane, 
Earth's mechanic arts are vain; 
Edison at heaven halks, — 
But Enoch walks. 



[26] 



BYE AND BYE 

Oh, bye and bye the blear of April gloom 
Shall burgeon to a wealth of summer bloom; 
And every dawn a brighter sun shall rise, 
And every day shall shimmer fairer skies. 
Then with the roses shall my life enroll 
The truer treasures of her deeper soul, 
And in God's vineyard shall my garden lie, — 
Oh, bye and bye ; yes, bye and bye. 

But bye and bye the meadows will be sear. 
And gone will be the gladness of the year. 
The beauty of the fragile rose be dead. 
And all the joyous hope of spring be fled. 
Then shall the winter with his arrows smite 
The shrinking spirit with a shrouding blight. 
Lost ! from the wilderness there faints the cry, — 
Ah, bye and bye ; ah, bye and bye. 

Oh, bye and bye the lagging hours shall fleet. 
And feebler shall our fading pulses beat, 
And farther shall our straining eyes discern 
The land of hope for which our poor hearts 

yearn. 
Sweet shall the music wake our opening ears ; 
Glad be the greetings through a mist of tears; 
Glorious the life of love that cannot die, — 
Oh, bye and bye; oh, bye and bye. 

[27] 



A NEW LEAF 

Out from the casement of the sky 
Flutters a love note tenderly ; 
By its page, brown and sear, 
Blotted by kiss and tear, 
A missive from the waning Year — 
My old sweetheart. 

She pleads in each fine line and vein, 
In sweet recall, to her again 
To turn ; but now a-near. 
With sunny smile and clear, 
Another stands, the fair New Year, 
And leads apart. 



[28] 



THE "U" IN UNIVERSE 

The morning is winsome and bright, Love ; 
Its dawning has sweetness and grace ; 
But never has dawned after night, Love, 
Such a dawn as the dawn in your face. 

The sunshine is golden and fair, Love ; 
The sunsl;iine is golden and fair; 
But never such gold has the sunshine unrolled 
As smiles in your beautiful hair. 

The zephyr is fresh and so pure. Love ; 

And sweet is the dew that it sips ; 

Yet purer your breath than the breeze from 

the heath 
And sweetest the dew of your lips. 

Ah, fair is the blue of the sky. Love ; 

But your eyes have a lovelier hue. 

For they've caught from above the pure light 

of your love 
That is truer than heaven's own blue. 



[29] 



WHEN WINDS ARE WHIST 

When winds are whist, and clover tops still, 

Dream, Love, as the sun shines warm 

And the mellow light wreathes the skyward 

hill,— 
Light sleep. Love, far away from harm. 
For the sweetest dreams are the dreams o' day, 
When you dream that your sweetheart's near 

you. Dear; 
And the bees hum a song of a land far away 
Where the skies are aye blue. Dear, and hearts 

are aye true, Dear, 
And the angels and cherubim all look like you. 

Dear. 

When twilight gloams, and the deep woods 

darken. 
Wake, Love, as the moon grows bright. 
And the elf-dogs bay, and elf-deer hearken, — 
Love, awake. Love, to the witching of night. 
For the tenderest time is the time of the stars 
When your lover is sitting with you. Dear, 
And Evening from heaven lets down all the bars 
So that loves may pass through. Dear, and sip 

divine dew. Dear, 
For all earth is heaven when one is with you, 

Dear. 



[30] 



THE CAVALIER 

You are in Halsian days, my friend ; you seem 
To be no memoried print, no artist's dream ; 
You are alive ; and even now quite able 
To take your seat at the high council table. 
And drain your beady bumper twice or thrice, 
And then could drink another in a trice. 
Now you are strutting in a noble court ; 
With gallant men and dames you have resort, 
Pass the sage counsel or the keen retort. 
Perhaps in war's alarm I see you stand. 
With burgher pikemen subject to your hand, 
Sword jewelled; and mayhappen that you held 
The walls of Leyden in that siege of eld 
When through cut dykes the sea o'erwelled ; 
Or on some world-winged voyage to far Ind, 
Or sullen drifting by the westering wind. 
The rich toll of wide commerce you have brought 
To Holland's freighted hulk, scarce rendered 

taut 
From tides that leap her crumbling dykes, and 

roar; 
And the still sterner rupture of invading war. 
Yours was the calm strength of your seas. 
You held the torch to light our fathers' way 
To all that e'er man's shackled spirit frees 
In learning, trade, religion, and law. 
Wear your brave finery ; that gorgeous lace 
Is not too noble for your manly face ; 
[31] 



That figured silk could find no worthier hest 
Than to adorn so adamant a breast, 
Whose citadel not all oppression's storm 
Could shake. As the stern mountain's form, 
Jagged with elemental furies, still is graced 
With all fair, tender flowerets interlaced. 
So weave we o'er your towering strength sublime 
Rich, gracious broideries from every clime, 
Unfading memories through all earth's changing 
time. 



[33] 



THE EIGHTH WONDER 

Nile's mystic mounts are brooding still, 
Yet man's heart turns to a low green hill. 

The Gardens blossomed on Babel's wall, 
Yet a single rose tree out-bloomed them all. 

The Phidian Zeus all golden stood; 
Man's noblest art was carved on wood. 

The Carian Marble mourns in vain; 
Behold, here grief and death were slain. 

At Rhodes, Colossus towered high ; 
A single tower has topped the sky. 

Dian's Temple, sunlike, shone apart ; 
One shrine alone reveals God's heart. 

The Pharos gleamed where navies whirled; 
A nobler beacon lights the world. 

Love glorified what sin made loss. 
Earth's sevenfold wonder — Jesu's cross. 



[33] 



SESAME 

Death is the time Hwixt the bud and the bloom ; 

'Tis the moment when roses are born ; 

'Tis the hush of the night ere the blush of the 

light 
Doth herald the halo of morn. 



[34] 



THE HUNT 

Away, away across the hill; 
The fox is running fit to kill; 
The huntsman here is surely marking 
How cheerily the hounds are barking; 
And down this clear November morn 
I hear them wind the hunting horn. 
Just watch us, in our hunting togs, 
All going swiftly to the dogs ; 
You see we're all aristocrats 
Quite evidently from our hats. 
That keen old guy in race attire 
Is master of hounds and local squire; 
He's rather fat and very jolly. 
And would look nice served up with holly. 
The Lady Clancy rides the sorrel; 
Her nag is pretty apt to quarrel. 
And so she keeps his rein so tight 
While he pulls on with all his might. 
Lord Tumpty is the last chap's name, — 
A beastly rider, but very game; 
Some day his horse will give a twitch 
And dump him sousing in the ditch. 
In front is Lady Caroline 
Who thinks her pony very fine; 
While he thinks she is quite entrancing 
As you can gather from his prancing. 
When they have chased the flying fox 
Through fields and folds and woods and locks 
[36] 



Until the horses all are tired, 

And all the scarlet coats are mired, 

And all the dogs are like to drop. 

And many riders come kerflop, — 

Then the swift hounds the fox assail. 

And kill ; his lovely brushy tail 

They cut as trophy of their run 

And the brave work they all have done. 

Today they'll give it, so I fancy. 

To that sweet girl, the Lady Clancy ; 

And then the squire, that fat old sinner, 

Will have them all come home to dinner. 



[86] 



WINDOW SHADES 

Swift on the wings of Winter 

Night hastens after Day, 

Dark flung her ancient mantle, 

Ashen her face and grey. 

Keen are the Night's wind arrows. 

Fierce is her lonesome cry. 

And dread and cold, on wood and wold, 

Is the stare of her ghostly eye. 

The legions of the storm king 
Come rushing to the fray, 
A wild and shaggy phalanx 
In horrent war array. 
Shriek ! as the winds are shrieking ! 
Shrink ! in the blinding white. 
While Death and Woe ariding go 
On the whirlwinds of the night! 



[37] 



"WE HAVE SEEN HIS STAR" 

We knew the charted heaven : sun, planet, moon. 
Fell meteor and comet — reverend fires ; 

Then that strange star, brighter than noon of 
noon. 
Wooing the soul with new and warm desires. 

Beckons the Star ; we follow with the eye, 

The heart, the foot ; our life was in its sway. 

Onward it floated, piercing the airy sky ; 

We stumbled drudging on through desert way. 

It stood, a beacon o'er the trackless years ; 

We found no fulgent choral throngs ; there 
smiled, 
Cradled in love and hope — sign worthy seers, 

Worthy a star — the world-prophetic Child. 

We have seen Him. The Star has paled; the 
hymn 

Angelic breathes too soft for human sense. 
The Child lives ; radiant, eterne, intense. 

Shines, though a myriad ancient stars are dim. 



[38] 



NOVEMBER DAY 

SuNKissED October piles her plenteous board ; 
The frisking squirrel heaps high his winter 

hoard ; 
Leaver scattered lie, like myriad warriors slain ; 
Broad vales gleam brightly with their golden 

grain ; 
Fair azure skies melt into deeper blue ; 
Far hilltops bathe in ever mellower hue ; 
Warm-winged zephyrs flit from bank and dune 
Where wimpling waters lisp their liquid tune. 

But when November comes, with brow a-gloam 

Sol scantly shines through heaven's cloud-cur- 
tained dome ; 

Eolus' cave the soft south wind receives ; 

While bustling Boreas shakes the scattered 
sheaves ; 

Rustles the fallen leaves, though passing light; 

Tiptilts the pigeon in her airy flight ; 

Brushes the bare boughs 'gainst the cottage 
thatch ; 

Whisks through the chinks ; unbidden lifts the 
latch ; 

Chills the poor peasant; mocks the croaking 
crow; 

Croons through the pleasant pine trees, murmur- 
ing low ; 

[39] 



Pipes on his sonant reed a shrilling air 
To rouse rough Winter from his bosky lair. 

Through some bleak bower or sombre, coolly 

glade 
Lone wanders Melancholy, rueful maid. 
In rusted raiment and of mournful mien. 
To brood upon fair summer's fading scene. 
Care's sable hood hath masked her brow of snow, 
And furrowed grief hath laid her roses low ; 
A limpid sadness darkles in her eye 
That ever down she casts with pensive sigh. 
A frosted lily in her hand she bears ; 
A faded rosebud at her throat she wears; 
And in her bosom's casket holds she fast 
Lost loves and blighted blessings of the past. 

Now trips sweet Cheerfulness at lightsome pace. 
With dancing eye, and rosy, smiling face ; 
Her beaming brow bright-painted leaves be- 

dight ; 
Dew diamonds deck her fairy fingers white ; 
All robed in sunshine is she, radiant, warm ; 
A zone of rainbows clasps her supple form ; 
And from her ivory distaff deft are spun 
Fine webs of dreamstuffs rippling in the sun. 

So goes November's day of shine and shade 
Till dusky twilight rolls up from the glade. 
And blinking stars their sleepy eyes do ope, 
And Phoebus trundles down the western slope. 
[40] 



FOUND DROWNED 

A STREAM-BORNE reek of rags; dank hair; 

Grey face, blear-eyes aghast — 
Look, all you live and fairl 

So Death floats past ! 

Quick! call his father, mother, friend; — 

Bear up the fearful freight! 
No hurry ; the dead is dead ; 

You call too late. 

Whose crime? If God's or men's the 
blame. 

Bury with book and bell; 
If his, — then for his shame 

Cross-roads of Hell. 

Insane? Is this world-orgy sane, 
Drink, dice, dance, drivel, mope? 

Witch-dance of sin is vain ; 
No God — no hope. 



[«] 



A LUMP OF COAL 

Carbon, — cousin to the diamond, 
Only substitute for sun, 
Let others merit by the carat, 
Thine esteem is by the ton. 

Clod, thou art emperor of industry ; 
Stone, thou dost melt the winter's might ; 
Gloom, from thy soot the lithe flames shoot 
And radiant fire illumes the night. 

Black, from thy heart leaps loveliness 
Lured by artful chemist stealth ; 
Thy perfumes rise like flower sighs ; 
Thou bindest the broken limbs of health. 

Ages and cycles and aeons ago 
Ancient forests laughed in sun ; 
Into them pent the storm winds went. 
And beauty from sky and ocean spun. 

Medicinal herb and fragrant flower. 
Brook babble and bird trill ; 
Summers and springs gave off'erings 
Their treasury vaults to fill. 

Deep, deep, deep the ocean tides 
Roared o'er the sunken shoal, 
And a world's delight was changed to blight 
As the forests turned to coal. 
[42] 



O Labour, unlock my prison ! 

Fire, leap at my cry ! 

1 shall live again in the lives of men 
The glory of days gone by. 



[43] 



MODERN MORPHEUS 

And more to lull him in his slmnber soft 

A jangling chime from high tower clanging 

down, 
Piano banging in the flat aloft, 
Mixed with sweet caterwauls, much like the 

sound 
Of cooing fiends, did cast him in a swound. 
No other noise, save autos, cars, and cries 
Such as are wont to annoy the troubled town 
Might enter, but sonorous Slumber lies 
Wrapped in umbrageous bedclothes full of 

enemies. 



[44] 



RAIN AT BUNKER HILL 

Grey crag, altar of flags and wreaths, 
Wet with woes unspoken 
I take the Eucharist Man bequeaths — 
" This is my body, broken." 

Grey rock in the vernal wave, 
Wet with unable showers. 
How many christenings do you crave 
To melt your heart to flowers ? 

Grey boulder from Hate's glacier tost. 
Wet with undawning grief, 
When shall God pour forth Pentecost 
And Love put forth her leaf? 



[45] 



THE OLD PREACHER 

The hymn crept to the hollow, hallowed crypt 
Of silence, and each vaporous echoing sprite 
Fell fainting starward; wan as early light 
On sunless surges, one, strengthless and stripped, 
Spake poor words, stumblingly, as fungus 

lipped. 
Then, as the morn from blear distaff of night 
Garners pale star threads for the day-spring 

bright. 
Our spun gleams to his glowing focus slipped. 

Wafts of warm joy, breaths of the dawning hour 
Lifted the lagging sails to farther quest ; 
Above the woodland sang a skyborn bird ; 
Sweet purled the perfume from each censered 

flower. 
Refreshed we rose from that deep fathomed rest 
As from a wave an angel's wing had stirred. 



[46] 



REVERY IN AUGUST 

The brazen sky reflecta the torrid glow 
Of Phoebus' chariot; and the blue expanse 
Of firmament is fleckless, save the gauzy film 
That hovers at the bourne of farthest earth 
And veils the vast beyond. — Mid-afternoon. — 
All nature lies in dreamful rest, save for 
The sighing breeze that moans and dies 
Upon the crested wood of oak and elm ; 
And Nature sleeps. 

The little birds have sought the shadowed shelter 
Of heavy woodlands to the right and left, or in 
The apple-orchard on the rolling hill-top. 
Tithonus e'en is silent, and his quavering note 
No more disturbs the dreamer. Lone, a crow 
Ungainly flies across to the big walnut, standing 

far 
Beside the summer-straightened channel of the 

spring. 
Grass-bedded deep I lie in the sun-filtering shade 
Whose scanty leaves but scarcely slant the rays. 
The tall blackberry bushes cast their shade 
Across the yellowed grass; and leaves at times 
Flit noiseless to the ground. Afar 
The waving cornfields on the right, whose tassels 

caught 
The breath of summer breeze that passed 
Above the dreamer. 

[47] 



Gold-brown are they ; and on the meadow's edges 
Deep-mixed with sumac's glorious wealth of 

crimson. 
While the brown hills mingling with heaven's 

blue, 
And mantled borders with their smoky grey, 
Are shading woodland green and forest dark, 
Upreared afar beyond the clovered mead 
Of purple, red, and white, and brown, and green, 
In sweet confusion and in scent as sweet. 
What is't to dream? 

To feel the unreality of time; the future, past. 
The present bliss or sorrowing transferred 
To misty past or future's shadow. 
To feel one's soul drift out on summer vapours 
And soar to the ethereal heights, and taste 
The fairy potions of delight, and quaff 
A finer air, pearl dew and golden light; 
To glide through intermingled time and space 
All unrestrained, care-free; yet still to know 
The shimmering thread of life that holds 
The soaring spirit to the mundane sphere ; 
To know unconsciously the fairy airs 
Are wafted from the odorous clover meads, and 

that 
The fairy couch is still the yellow, mellow mat 
Of orchard grasses. 

The angel whispers from the higher air that seem 
To speak of younger day, nor when nor where 

[48] 



Can mind recall. What nameless joys 
Inspire, what fond delight 
Yet ever dreamy, mellow, misty, strange. 
As though the Future held it forth, yet Past 
Held in remembrance ! 

— A woodland valley in some charmed spot, 
Secluded, cool, and from intrusion free ; 

With here the spring from Nature's goblet 

pouring 
Down silvery rocks, and moss and flowered bank ; 

— The river flowing on through forest shade 
And now emerging in the sun's bright beam. 
While the pliant oar lies listless, comes a face, — 
A shy. Undine shadow of the past. 
Haunting, familiar, evanescent, strange. 

That vanishes into the vapoury air. And now 
The rapids roar, as though the wind 
Sighed in the cedars. 

And there the cornfields wave, and nearer still 
The headed clover to the breezes nods. 
They pass. — A vague, weird longing for an un- 
known bliss, 
A wistful hearkening to a heavenly chord 
Of seraph melody, as from the lyres 
A faint breeze wafts from far, and leaves 
The soul a-sighing. 

So in the happy isle the Lotus blossoms 
Hung tempting to the eye, and, eaten of, 
Embalmed the spirit in their sweet 

[49] 



And restful spices ; 

Soothing from care and hushing restless motion ; 
Stilling the pulse of memory, hope, affection ; 
Lulling the sense in dreamful, waking slumber 
That never ceased. 



[50] 



AN 'APORTH OF LANGUAGE 

An acrid old abecedarian of York, 
Having acromatopsy and very dyspeptic, 
Did not know the abracadabra of Cork, 
For his language was awfully acataleptic. 

A barbate, belligerent Bashibazook 

With the brawn of Barnassus and Barmecide 

blarney, 
Met our friend of the blear and batrachian look 
In the brumous and belluine bogs of Killarney. 

Calefactory Cork and York swift circumvolve 
Cataclysms of speech cacaphonous to folk 
Who by aid of Crystomathies maybe might solve 
How language to speak as she ought to be spoke. 



[51] 



WORDSWORTH 

Not as the playmate of a summer's day 

Sweet Poesy disported at thy side, 

But as a cahn and contemplative bride 

She wooed the pensive hours. Not as in play 

Thou lookedst on the nebulous archway 

That flung across the heavens its suns of pride, 

But by stern gazing, soul intensified. 

Didst ravel stars and truth from shrouding 

grey. 
Untutored was thy mind of modes ; alone 
Thine eye concentered upon nature's form 
Or bold simplicity of man. Unknown 
To thee the wilder strife of variant storm ; 
But with thy pure soul rapt in high serene. 
From Rydal's holy light thou view'st the scene. 



[52] 



THE POOL OF LONDON 

The seas are in, and the hurrying flood 
Ruffles the river's baffled flow, 
Whose currents of many a mingled mud 
Reel toward the ocean tides below 
To get a whiff" of a norther stiff" 
That reds the face and rouses the blood 
When the Baltic breezes blow. 

What a dismal tangle of mast and spar, 
Of funnel and tiller, of tackle and sail ; 
The huge hulks loom through the watery war, 
And the gloomy reek which the tugs exhale 
Wreathes the shrouds with its dismal clouds, 
And spreads out a dense pall near and far. 
And turns the daylight pale. 

Amid the forest of masts and beyond, 

Rise up the city's many a spire; 

St. Paul's lifts a sullen dome unsunned 

Near the tower of the terrible fire ; 

While a flag floats dim from that fortress grim 

Where monarchs on captives were ever fond 

Of wreaking their vengeance dire. 

What ships have sailed on this turbid tide.? 
What navies of state and war and trade.? 
From a mart as wide as the world is wide 
Rich argosies still at this port are stayed; 
[53] 



And the myriad needs that the city breeds 
To the teeming, toiling folk are supplied 
When their sweat and blood is paid. 

ships that fly through every clime, 

1 beg you not to bring to me 

Sweet gums or gems or the manifold chime 

Of the silvery rivers of luxury ; 

I have quite enough of silk and stuff, 

If you'll only bring in the briefest time 

My love from a farofF sea. 



[54] 



PRAYER 

I WATCHED where gentle childhood calm reposed 

In trust so perfect, innocent, and mild; 

Her breathing light and pure, her eyes soft 

closed, — 
So sweet the sleep the cherub radiant smiled. 
No thought of harm or danger, pain or care; 
The guardian presence of her Lord was there. 

As to and fro the sweet breath flitted past 
The portal of that human temple fair. 
Each gentle heave and sigh succeeding fast 
Seemed like the breathing of a soul in prayer. 
Prayer is the breathing of the spirit race. 
Exhaling faith and still inhaling grace. 



[55] 



ENOUGH 

To live, not merely get a living; 
Be to thine own faults less forgiving ; 
Shoot aspirant tendrils toward the new, 
Yet rootlike cling to that proved true ; 

To love the garb and grace of Work, 
For doubts and rights oft cloak the shirk; 
To make life brother to cloud and clod ; 
Spend less on self, and more on God ; 

To yearn for flower and sea and sky, 
For pictures and music and poetry. 
Yet live 'mid the city's muck and roar, 
And be a Christ to the callous poor ; 

To know sin more, nor love man less. 
And still a full chalice of gladness press 
To lips that bless and lips that curse. 
Alike for the good and the worse than worse ; 

To pass forgotten, and never touch 

The hem of the beauty you love so much ; 

To lift earth skyward a little a day ; 

To pay as you preach ; to live as you pray ; — 

Though little indeed all this sufficed, 
Enough to have lived in the life of the Christ. 

[56] 



SONNET IN Ab 

Many the wonders I this day have seen : — 
The sun when first he swabbed away the tears 
Dripped from the water-spout; the saucy jeers 
That from the feathery jays fill us with teen; 
The backyard with its scantness, its mud's green, 
Its chips, tin cans, staves, hoops, and other 

gears ; 
Its voice lugubrious which whoso hears 
Must fear what will be from that which has been. 
E'en now, dear George, while this for you I 

write, 
The janitress my attic room is sweeping 
So scantly, though the dust clogs breath and 

sight, 
The carpet scarcely through the dirt is peeping. 
Yet what, without I write all this to thee. 
Is there to write about on land or sea? 



[57] 



OOMPS 

Beside a dark-green suction-poomps 

There lived a maiden fair and ploomps. 

One spring old Death 

Got hold of her breath, 

For everything ends in oomps. 

CHORUS 

Everything ends in oomps, 
Everything ends in oomps. 
Her toes and thoomps 
And pears and ploomps, — 
Everything ends in oomps. 

They laid her snugly in her toomps. 

Along her sorrowing lover coomps ; 

He planted a rose 

Right over her nose, 

For everything ends in oomps. 

CHORUS 

And now the red magnificent cloomps 

Of odoriferous roses bloomps. 

She found she must 

Return to dust. 

For everything ends in oomps. 

CHORUS 

[58] 



We carol the maiden fair and ploomps ; 
She's snugly lying in her toomps ; 
She'll not get out, 
So let us shout 
Everything ends in oomps. 

CHORUS 

Everything ends in oomps, 
Everything ends in oomps, 
Her toes and thoomps 
And pears and ploomps, — 
Everything ends in oomps. 



[591 



SUNSET AND EVENING 

SUNSET 

Swing high, swing low, 

Over the rolling plain 

The Sun swings his golden censer, 

High-priest at old Autumn's fane. 

The blue sky-dome is the temple, 

The altar the grey earth's mould. 

With its ofF'rings poured 

From the Year's great hoard. 

And its mounting fires red and gold. 

From shining hands 

Layered in crystal sea, 

Sweet incense rolled through the heavens 

Like echoes of minstrelsy ; 

Then out from the radiant temple. 

Reddened with sacred glow. 

The Sun down sank 

'Neath the curtain bank 

With its fringes portent of snow. 



EVENING 

'Neath arching boughs of green I lie 
While soft June's slumbrous hilltops rise 
And shut the gloaming gates of day. 
Sweet scent of roses, breathing balm, 

[60] 



Anear my slow-swung hammock blows ; 
Faint zephyrs fan the burning brow 
Of labour-weary Day. 

The Moon 
Dips down and peeps out from behind 
Cloud-pillars shining wondrous white. 
Stars radiant dance in Night's ballroom 
Now view their myriad beauteous forms 
In limpid seas, then stately move 
Down heaven's high hall, and disappear 
Behind the silvern veil that hides 
Earth's western windows. 



[61] 



THERE WAS A KING 

There was a king in Belgium, 

A patron of the arts, 
Who furbished palace fa9ades, 

And aped a King of Hearts ; 
He broke his treaty promise, 

And bled the Congo well. 
There was a king in Belgium ; 

Is there a king in Hell? 

There was a king in Belgium, 

A lover of the folk ; 
He kept his knightly honour. 

And spurned the Teuton yoke ; 
They crucified his country — 

Famished and red and riven ; 
There is no king in Belgium ; 

Is there no King in Heaven ? 



[62] 



THE HITTING OF THE SAWDUST 
TRAIL 

Billy, little Billy, has been roasting Philadel- 
phia, 

Brimstone basting with the latest sporting news 
of heaven and hell f ye. 

He's an angel Gabriel honking to make 3^our 
goose flesh creep. 

And the Quaker saints are rising from their late 
long sleep. 

Out buzz the sinner swarm, devil's own debacle, 

Bang the pans and hive them in salvation taber- 
nacle. 

Angora, Chamois, Cashmere, Bighorn, Backlot 
breeds without the pale — 

Billy-goats are hitting the sawdust trail. 

Here they come, there they come, willingly as 
Barkuses, 

While Billy peppers epigrams into their old 
carkuses. 

Drunk with nut Sunday, all the highbrows scorn- 
ing* 

They certainly are off — at Billydelphia in the 
morning. 

" Bless you, Mr. Sunday," says the pious Presi- 
dent ; 

And " bless you," cry the converts, that crowd 
the gospel tent. 

[63] 



" Damn you, keep off my barleycorns," the wall- 
eyed Brewers wail. 

While the boozers keep a hitting that sawdust 
trail. 

The ghosts of Philadelphia are a-walking in the 

parks : 
Penn cannot rest while Billy makes irreverent re- 
marks. 
Poor Richard haunts the hallowed halls, making 

profuse apology 
For bringing lightning on a string to blaze in 

Bill's theology. 
Groans Morris, " Oh, if only he in my place had 

exchequered." 
Sighs Whitefield, " I'm afraid he'll break my 

60,000 record." 
Says Washington, " His recruiting would have 

made the Lion quail," 
For there's many a thousand hitting the sawdust 

trail. 

Jefferson mutters, " Had I been so sulphurous of 
word, 

The names he calls the devil I'd have used on 
George the 3rd." 

Old Independence bell is sick, " The folks for- 
sake me illy, 

I've as much brass, more tongue and I am no 
more cracked than Billy." 
[64] 



He's busting high society, big business is for- 
gotten, 

All Denmark gasps to learn that Philadelphia, 
too, is rotten. 

Blow big your bulging cheeks of prayer to a 
hallelujah gale 

Till the Penrose pohticians hit the sawdust trail. 

Here's a toast to little Billy, may he live to lam- 
bast us, 

He who stole the devil's toasting fork, and 
taught him how to cuss. 

Knight errant of the Gospel, may his keen lance 
never fail 

Till the stiffs of holy Boston hit the sawdust 
trail. 



[65 



IN THE LIBRARY 

When she goes by it seems the rows 

Of classic volumes stand tiptoes, 

And sunshine pours, and music plays 

Through all the book-room's fretted ways, 

And each dead tome with warm life glows. 

I can well say from sweet heart throes 

Who past my prison alcove goes ; 

Each fusty hedge leaps all ablaze 

When she goes by. 

But then, alack, no greeting flows 

From her blue eyes, no zephyr blows 

A balmy kiss ; with forward gaze 

Which all my yearning never stays. 

She follows straight her pretty nose 

When she goes by. 



[601 



SONOMA 

CALIFORNIA 

From Atlantic to Pacific 
Love leaps the wave and plain ; 
Mountain nor sea can barrier be 
For the fetterless wings of the brain. 

From the city to the valley, 
From glare and dust and riot, 
From raking pangs, from wolfish fangs. 
To home's sequestered quiet. 

There brood the sun-bright mountains 
Over orchard, vineyard, and down ; 
The white roads wind from hills behind, 
By homestead, hamlet, and town. 

Through house and yard and farm, 
Each pleasant, friendly place, 
With silver hair and heart of prayer 
Goes she of the mother's face. 

Across a stormy world, 

And a world so strangely wide. 

Our hearts still seek dear old Dry Creek, 

And there keep Christmas tide. 



[67] 



SPRING BREAK 

When the skies are blue and haz3^, 
And the fields are bare and brown, 
And the winds are kind of lazy, 
And the crows are cawin' round, 
Then's the choicest kind of livin' 
In the meadow, by the lake. 
When the winter frost's a-givin' 
And the Spring begins to break. 

x\ll around me is the lullin' 
Of the brooks a-croonin' nigh. 
And there's wakes of sunshine rollin' 
Where the clouds is sailin' by. 
And the willow's hair's aglowin' 
Like a glory round her head. 
And the grass and flowers is throwin' 
The snow covers off their bed. 

Then there's music in the sobbin's 
Of a lonesome summer breeze, 
Or a-list'nin' to the robins 
Singin' anthems in the trees ; 
And a fellow dreams of heaven, 
Wishin' that he'd never wake. 
When the winter frost's a-givin' 
And the Spring begins to break. 



[68] 



And there ain't a gladder fellow 
When the sky turns blue again, 
And the sunshine lies so mellow 
On the woods and fields and plain 
For it's joy to just be livin' 
In the meadow, by the lake. 
When the winter's frost's a-givin' 
And the Spring begins to break. 



[69] 



LOVE'S BIMETALLISM 

William Jennings Bryan, what have you 

gone and done? 
You'd coin the silver and the gold at sixteen 

grains to one. 
But America has turned you down because, if 

truth be told. 
They wanted silver coins, but on a standard all 

of gold; 
So now each silver dollar's free from silver's 

venal faults 
For it means there's gold to back it up in Uncle 

Sammie's vaults. 

"When Helen says her silver hair is something 
sad and strange 

1 say, " The gold is very nice, but still we must 

have change ; 
And while we wouldn't rashly coin grey hairs 

sixteen to one. 
But love to see the tresses that the flaming gold 

has spun. 
Yet when your hairs are silver, Dear, by metal- 

lurgic art 
They bear the token value of the gold mines in 

your heart." 



[70] 



WHAT PRICE HAPPINESS? 

In the Devil's bargain sale 

Are sin-soiled remnants of happiness 
Marked down from the cost of a soul, to less 

Than the price of a pint of ale. 

Is such happiness cheap? Beware! — 

It is woven of shoddy, and shame, and sor- 
row; 
It will shrink, and shred, and fade tomor- 
row, 
And leave you the rags of despair. 

Is such happiness cheap? No, never! 

It is sweated from other men's laboured 
fears ; 

'Tis stolen from loom of the yearning years, 
Where humanity moans forever. 

True happiness naught can buy. 

When meekly we do the will of heaven, 
'Tis the priceless blessing that grace has 
given, 

'Tis the boon of the bending sky. 



[71] 



ON A PASTEL PORTRAIT OF A CHILD 

Ah, thou art caught and held in filmy flesh, 
Thou morning beam ; and though the gaudy Day 
With higher light and wider scene enmesh, 
Yet shall he not dissolve thine earlier ray. 
Thou weavest prophetic futures in thy loom, 
Purfled with promises of petalled bloom. 

" Out of the mouth of babes," from the clear eyes 
Of childhood, issues earth's profoundest lore ; 
Within thy cryptic crystal swaying rise 
Unfolding visions of the Evermore ; 
Within thy wreathed shell forever surge 
Murmurs from ocean's immemorial verge. 

" A little child shall lead " ; the ascending race 
Follows a lengthening childhood ; from thee flow 
The subtle sympathy and magic grace 
Of every family sense and social glow ; 
O'er thy portentous cradle ever brood 
A mother's and a state's solicitude. 

" Except ye so become " ; the heavenward soul 

Is a perennial childhood, sensitive. 

Plastic to tender hints and soft control 

Of every haunting pulse the zephyrs give. 

Humanity's divinest diadem 

Bestars the broAv of childhood's Bethlehem. 

[72] 



EARTHQUAKES 

You never mind a cyclone ; you can bear a hot 

monsoon; 
A blizzard, or a waterspout, or twisting tough 

typhoon ; 
But when you strike an earthquake — or rather, 

it strikes you, 
A thousand fearful tremours go a-thrilling 

through and through. 

Our old theology has had some very heavy 

knocks. 
And people all are waking up in spasms or in 

shocks ; 
Some think religion's all played out, and faith is 

just a-dying. 
Science has tumbled Church and Book, and sent 

the preachers flying. 

Don't run! Let's watch the steeples go smash- 
ing to the ground, — 

Traditions, dogmas, theories, are crashing all 
around. 

A middle-aged Cathedral or a grimy old Bastille, 

How they mutter, and they totter; how they 
rumble and they reel ! 



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But some things stand, — of that you may be 

sure, — 
Longer than stone or steel, or heaven or earth 

endure ; 
Above the smoke and dust and din, through 

crack and quake and lurch. 
Stand God's eternal monuments — the Bible and 

the Church. 



[74] 



THE CLOISTER 

How pleasant is the ancient, homely church 

Scarce lifted o'er the neighbour cottages 

Hemming the square of green where lifts the lone 

Memorial statue. On the aging walls 

The ivy trails her never-dying green, 

While near the blazing May shoots forth her 

bloom. 
Impetuous of spring. Above the thatch 
Droop an acacia's branches ; a fair hedge 
Of holly shields the doorways ; while the rose 
Makes e'en the grey stone sensuous 
With her rich hue and perfume ; the rare arch 
Of that old traceried window harbours still 
The loveliness which monks' hands have be- 
queathed 
To those who took such heritage with joy, 
But spurned what monks thought better dower 

still — 
A narrow faith and fierce, unkindly zeal. 

Here is the heart of England; see how quietly 
The home is clustered near the church ; the past. 
Nameless and named, stands here in this still 

square 
While life goes on amid such atmosphere 
Of reverent institution, custom, faith. 
Age leans on youth, and takes her customed 

round 

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Along the fair walks cincturing the green, 
With head and body bowed, thinking of many 

things. 
While youth looks dreamy-eyed, yet does not see 
Beyond the roofs of home, or the acacia's sprays, 
Or brilliant hawthorn, or the ivy green. 
No child plays on the lawn; the mower swings 
His keen scythe through the tender grass ; adoze 
Are aged men upon an ancient seat beneath 
The statue ; while two mouldering clerks 
Discuss a week-old paper whose stale news 
Is the one breath in this sequestered calm. 
And yet how beautiful the fringed lawn 
Which smiles with many a daisy fair and mild. 



[76 



THE DRAMA 

The stars are scintillating; the glittering scenes 

unroll 
With tinsel, blare and gaud, to cloak their 

poverty of soul. 
The musky fair, the sweating crowd, applaud 

the silly sally. 
The platitude, the mossy jest, the leer from 

Leper's Alley. 

So this is " nature's mirror," this humanity's 
best school, — 

This vapid, vaunting play that skims the sea- 
son's shallow pool? 

Life's teeming currents touch not here ; they seek 
the farther sea. 

Where melt time's dateless margins in the vast 
eternity. 

Life's drama does not glister upon a gilded 
stage ; 

'Tis not police court sewage, nor society's out- 
rage; 

Its pomp is not of parliaments, and kings and 
golden lords ; 

It does not scream with suffragettes, nor fight 
with bombs or swords. 



[77] 



Here's drama — that soul battling with his dear- 
est sin; 

This climb through thunderous crags without ; 
that burst through toils within. 

And greater far, on Golgotha, in supreme 
tragedy, 

A Saviour crowns His dying love with immor- 
tality. 



[78] 



FIRE AND WATER 

What's half so charming as a winsome face 
Rimmed in the window of a Shaker bonnet, 
Blushing and dimpling, though with downcast 

grace. 
While her dark hair hath gleams of rain upon it. 
Ah, sweeter thus than any wilding rose 
Peeped through the dewy tangle of the brier ; 
When snowy lids her liquid eyes disclose. 
This maid-o'-the-rain doth set my heart afire. 



[79] 



MIDSUMMER REST 

Why dost thou in the city's fearful hum 
And the hot stupors of the civic press 
Endure hfe's fevers ? Why not hither come ^ 

And in this placid field thy patient soul possess? 

Here the ambrosial grasses feed the flocks ; 
Here the sweet nectar of the brook flows by ; 
Cool boughs assuage the sun's fierce summer 

shocks ; 
While warm woods bask in silence, drowsing 

goldenly. 

Deft nature charms her very self ; she sighs, 
Leans pensive on her elbow, and looks long 
Into this glowing mirror whose fair skies 
And brighter hues and shapes to miniature be- 
long. 

The kine reflective, on the watery marge 
Revolve the memory of a former feast ; 
One loves the laving flood, and like a barge 
Stands moored and shadowed, a most philo- 
sophic beast ; 

One quaff's the sparkling stuff" and finds it wetter 
Than all the cooling brews that art distils ; 
One broods on glassy forms that here beset her ; 
And one, contemplative, beholds a light beyond 
yon hills. 

[80] 



Chop down those trees; drain off that limpid 
stream ; 

Drive all those cattle to the flesher's pen ; 

Build on these sites ; f og-blurr that skyey gleam ; 

Crowd streets with jostled, stifling, and despair- 
ing men. 

Who bids ? The civilising power that hf ts 
Weak folk to strength, that makes the lowly 

great ? 
Nay, let me lie and watch the filmy drifts 
Of sky and stream, and keep my humble shep- 
herd's state. 

I'll trade six million souls for only one 
With me to dwell in simple pastoral bliss ; 
Her amber spirit pervades the quiet noon 
And lends a softer light to gentle scenes like this. 



[81] 



"WHEN I CONSIDER" 

When I consider graces constellate 

In thee who art my universal sky, 

Stars, moon, and fleecy clouds but aggravate 

Tlie chilly night of thine austerity. 

And though thy kindly beauty dews my grove. 

Shall I ne'er see the flush of morning gleam 

And the rich rising of thy sunny love 

Gladden the roseate hill and silver stream? 

Canst thou no horoscope of love relate 

From the astrology of Cupid drawn? 

Is there no star reveals a kindly fate 

And bravely leads the entrance of the dawn? 

For the hot vanguard of the feverish day. 

Grant that not Mars but Venus lead the way. 



[82] 



NEW YEAR'S GREETING 

Back to thy Sun, erring Earth, 
From winter's sad undoing, 

And Spring shall have her second birth, 
And Nature her renewing. 

Thermometers can but record. 

Kind hearts can rule the weather ; 

Though wintry days be on the board, 
Let's summer it together. 

Let's have dull skies aglow with May, 
Bare boughs agleam with cherry, 

Have coral isles in Baffin's Bay, 
And June in January. 



[83] 



HAPPY OLD YEAR 

St. Sylvester, motley jester, 

Prances through Milwaukee town. 

Throngs the crowd, bellowing loud, 

Down and up — up and down. 

Clang — clang — bells all bang — 

Wild the welkin's roar. 

Sirens scream, spouting steam ; 

Snarling discords snore. 

Horns hoot — trumpets toot, 

Writhing into riot ; 

Swirls of noise — girls — boys — 

Flood the fields of quiet ; 

Music halls squeal squalls ; 

Fiddles screech in cafe ; 

Saints from church — drunks a-lurch — 

Howling midnight dafFy. 

Zany hope — parrot dope — 

Froth of frenzied brewin' ; 

'Raus mit ihm — old pipe dream ! 

Hoch the happy new one! 

Suddenly still the blatant trumpery noise; 

Through the hush comes a holy, vast diapason. 

Demiurge from the cosmic organ deaf Beethoven 
played on. 

Sublime to create a dozen eternal Troys. 

Then I knew that Methusaleh walked for cen- 
turies nine, 

[84] 



While heaven was rayed with truth; asphodels 

blue 
With beauty brushed his sandals ; he drank wine 
Of goodness from old beakers, beaded with 

Eden's dew. 
Illusion, fragrance, and mystery, prismic three 
From which are woven life's fibril harmony, 
Star-throated sang when earth with morn was 

brave ; 
Rolled Avith the primal seas from strand to cave ; 
Swept the Eolian elms in the pristine wave 
Of the wandering Invisible. 

Lean thy breast 
On ancient ruins ; read faded letters from cedarn 

chest ; 
Gaze at old paintings of old places ; range 
Old memories of old millenniums strange. 
Old friend, as dear as old, hand clasping mine, 
Tell me quietly, with the voice of auld lang syne. 
That the happy, happy old year shall not 

change. 



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